My diary about my life as a writer with a day job, entrepreneur, reader, health enthusiast, and runner; random thoughts, new discoveries and whatever else that keeps me in the throes of everlasting procrastination.

Saturday, December 29, 2007

I've been spending time going over the chapters I've written already. I confess. I'm like, "What the hell was I smoking when I wrote this mess?" What I'm finding out is that I'm not a good at writing under pressure or forcing myself to write if I'm not feeling it. Which is one reason why it would be hard to write to whatever the market dictates.

Okay, let me tell you what happened. Earlier this year, I was trying to hurry up to submit the first few chapters to my agent to shop. Probably wouldn't be an issue, except that I had so much going on this year (moving, job hunting and hopping) that I couldn't fully concentrate and get into a groove with this book. I've known for the longest the story I wanted to write. But in a rush to submit SOMETHING, I skipped my normal writing process. I didn't fully sketch or flesh characters. Well, I was only going to submit three chapters. Character sketches wouldn't matter for that, right? I could always go back and flesh them out later. NOT!

And then, I found what is comfortable for me is to just focus on the plot the first draft, then round out the story and flavor the second and subsequent drafts. Cool. Okay, but I don't know what the hell I did for the first five chapters that I wrote. It didn't flow. Characters were flat. I had first and third POV in the first chapter. I mean, I really looked at it and said, "What the hell? Who fucked up my story?!" LOL It was so screwed that it took me a minute to figure out how to smooth it out.

Well, the first thing I did was go back to my normal writing process. I went to what works for me. I sketched my characters to the fullest, then did my chapter by chapter plot outline. It still took me a minute to smooth out the first chapter. It was the opening I wanted, but it didn't flow. But I massaged it and massaged until now, GWA-LA! It's the way I want it.

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Cherlyn

About Cherlyn

Cherlyn Michaels is the author of Counting Raindrops Through a Stained Glass Window (Hyperion Books, 2005) and First Fridays (Hyperion Books, 2007). Cherlyn resides in Georgia where she works as an Engineer. She is currently working on her third novel and other writing projects.